A Husband of Her Own (Dundee, Idaho #2)(39)
Author: Brenda Novak

Josh sized up his next shot, which was pretty clean. One bank off the far left edge and the eight ball would land in the right corner pocket. Easy. Game over. She was history.

He glanced up at her and her father before sending the eight ball rolling. It banked off the far left edge, just like it was supposed to, and traveled in a straight line for the corner pocket. Rebecca was so sure it was going to drop, she almost set her stick down and started getting out her money. But it didn’t. It slowed and came to a stop at the very edge of the pocket.

Mary groaned and Billy Joe murmured, “I thought he had her. Jeez, that was close!”

It was close. But not close enough. She had a reprieve.

Booker caught her eye and smiled. Now’s your chance, his look said. You can do it.

Giving him a slight nod, she sent her stripe flying decisively into the side pocket. Now only the eight ball remained for her, too—and it was already hovering an inch from where she needed it to go. Telling herself to forget that her father was watching, to forget he was even there, she tapped the white ball so that it barely kissed the eight. The eight slipped over the edge, making a satisfying thunk, and the game was over.

“I won,” she said, feeling a rush of relief and hope as she looked to her father. “I just beat Josh.”

“Yeah, well, your mother needs you,” he said and walked off.

“CAN YOU BELIEVE Rebecca brought Booker to her parents’ anniversary party?” Mary asked as Josh drove her home from the party.

Mary had been talking nonstop since they’d gotten into his Excursion. He’d only been half listening, for the most part. He wasn’t interested in a recap of the compliments she’d received on her new jacket. But he heard her mention Booker and Rebecca. “They’re friends,” he said.

Mary adjusted her seat belt. “Friends and lovers, probably.”

Josh scowled. “Would you give up on that? Booker was hitting on Katie all night. I hardly think he and Rebecca are lovers.”

She turned to face him, using the door as her backrest. “You never know. Rebecca strikes me as a little kinky. She might like a ménage àtrois once in a while.”

“I don’t think so,” he said sharply. Josh suspected her sexual experience fell far short of her reputation. Some of the things he’d said in the past were probably to blame for why people like Mary considered Rebecca kinky, and he hadn’t had a damn clue about her sex life when he’d made those statements. It was just part of the smear campaign they’d waged against each other.

“She ran away with that biker,” Mary pointed out.

Josh stopped for a light. Johnny Red. Even a Hells Angel hadn’t been able to handle Rebecca—strong evidence that Josh was lucky she didn’t seem as drawn to him as he sometimes was to her. But logic and evidence didn’t always help. Not at moments like that one in her house…

“So she had a fling,” he said, starting through the intersection as the light turned green. “I think most of us are guilty of poor judgment on occasion.”

“Poor judgment on occasion? What do you call moving in with Booker when she’s engaged to another man?” Mary turned up the heater, although Josh was already tempted to roll down the window. “And what about bringing Booker to the party tonight? Did you see the look on Doyle’s face? I thought he was going to have a stroke.”

Josh had been more concerned about the look on Doyle’s face when Rebecca had beaten him at pool. There hadn’t been a hint of the pleasure or pride he’d expected when he’d purposely missed his last shot. He’d paid four hundred dollars to see Rebecca’s father give her a shred of praise for a change, and it hadn’t netted him so much as a smile or a “good game.” Worse, it had confused him even more about how he felt toward Rebecca. There were times when fear that she’d be hurt made him do the damnedest things—like trying to make her feel welcome in her own parents’ home or losing a four-hundred-dollar bet.

Part of him wanted to be her friend. All of him wanted to be her lover. And whatever sanity he had left still tried to warn him that he’d be a fool to become, either.

“I can’t believe she’s taking advantage of Hatty the way she is,” Mary was saying. “I mean, it’s bad enough that Booker’s living off her. But now Rebecca, too? I don’t blame her father for being upset. That would make me—”

“Wait a second,” Josh interrupted, feeling the irritation that occasionally haunted him when he was with Mary. “How do you know she’s taking advantage of Hatty?”

“You don’t think she and Booker are actually paying rent, do you?”

They passed the drive-in, the library and Dundee’s two historic buildings, one of which was now a bed-and-breakfast. “I don’t know that they’re not,” he said, turning the blasting heater vents away from him. “Besides, it doesn’t matter. Rebecca’s only going to be living there for another—what, four weeks?”

Josh was relieved to think Rebecca would be marrying so soon. Surely that would finally put an end to this strange attraction. Not only would she be completely unavailable, she’d be living in Nebraska. Whatever had happened between them in the past would have to be forgotten, the good—like that night a year ago last summer—along with the bad.

Maybe after she was gone, he’d be able to make a commitment to Mary….

“What?” he said when he realized Mary had stopped talking and was watching him a little too closely.

“Why are you suddenly sticking up for her?” she asked. “You two have never gotten along.”

Josh couldn’t tolerate the heater any longer. “I’m not sticking up for her,” he said, flipping it off. “I just don’t think what’s going on in her life is any of our business, okay? She gets enough of that kind of thing already.”

“Then I guess you don’t want to hear what I learned tonight at the party,” Mary said.

He drove into Mary’s neighborhood and pulled up in front of her parents’ house, where she’d been living since the divorce. “Not if it’s more conjecture about Rebecca’s sex life,” he said.

“It’s not. It’s about her wedding.”

After the way he’d criticized Mary’s gossiping, he could hardly show interest, but she definitely had him with that statement. “I don’t want to know,” he lied.